IMPORTANT TECHNICAL BULLETIN
The following bulletin is only applicable if you are an ABR customer and
are using Archive with SMSEXPIRE=. Below is the letter that was sent to
all ABR customers on November 24, 1999.
November 24, 1999
A Y2K problem affecting ABR customers who archive SMS-managed data sets
Innovation has discovered a problem with the calculation of expiration
dates for archived SMS-managed data sets that may result in data sets
being incorrectly expired on 1/1/2000.
If you do not archive SMS-managed data sets with
ABR, you are not affected. If you do not use the SMSEXPIRE= operand, you
are not affected.
You will have this problem only if you use ABR control statements such
as DUMP TYPE=ARC,SMSMANAGE=YES,SMSEXPIRE=…
The problem occurs when you archive SMS data sets with SMSEXPIRE=YES or
PRT, and an expiration of 99.365 (“never-expire”) is assigned to a data
set by the user or by ABR. ABR may incorrectly change this expiration
date in the Archive Control File, allowing the archived data sets to expire
on or after January 1, 2000. The expiration date of your archive tapes,
recorded in your tape management system, is not affected. An FDRARCH REORG
job run on or after January 1 may delete the archived copy of these data
sets.
One cause of this problem was introduced by recent IBM APARs OW38640 and
OW38638, which changed IBM’s rules for the interpretation of an expiration
field in the management class. There are other causes, including the use
of EXPDT=99000 on TAPExx DD statements, and archived data sets which you
intend to be retained permanently.
On a related topic
If you select data sets for Archive or Superscratch based on expiration
date (EXPIRED operand in ABR), you should be aware that when IBM allocates
a data set and its expiration date calculated from RETPD= is 99.365, it
is automatically changed to 2000.001. This may result in fewer data sets
selected by ABR archive jobs executed on 12/31/99. Also, archived backups
that would have expired on 12/31/99 will be retained an extra day.
Innovation regrets any inconvenience this problem may cause you. We believe
that it is important to be proactive by notifying customers of these types
of problems. Therefore, we need to identify all customers who may potentially
be susceptible to this problem.
We are asking all ABR customers to complete the information below
and fax or mail a copy of this form back to us. The fax number is 973-890-7147.
A prepaid envelope is included for your convenience. Please check YES
or NO for each question:
___ YES ___ NO My installation archives SMS-managed data sets with ABR
___ YES ___ NO My installation uses SMSEXPIRE= on the DUMP TYPE=ARC statement
If you answered YES to the second question, please contact Innovation
immediately for assistance. You can call us at the number below, email
us at the support address below, or fax this sheet back and we will call
you.
|
